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THE  DREAM 

By 
JOHN    MAS  EFI  EL  D 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


IN  MEMORY  OF 

PAUL  TURNER,  U.S.M.CR. 

KILLED  IN  ACTION,  SAIPAN 

JUNE,  1944 


OF    THIS    LIMITED,    AUTOGRAPHED    EDITION     OF 

THE  DREAM 
7SO  COPIES  HAVE  BEEN  PRINTED  OF  WHICH  THIS  IS 


J . 


THE  DREAM 


BY 
JOHN  MASEFIELD 

Gallipoli 

King  Cole 

Right  Royal 

The  Faithful 

Lost  Endeavor 

Selected  Poems 

A  Mainsail  Haul 

Captain  Margaret 

The  Daffodil  Fields 

The  Old  Front  Line 

Esther  and  Berenice 

Multitude  and  Solitude 

The  War  and  the  Future 

Collected  Poems  and  Plays 

Enslaved  and  Other  Poems 

Salt  Water  Poems  and  Ballads 

Good  Friday  and  Other  Poems 

Philip  the  King  and  Other  Poems 

The  Tragedy  of  Pompey  the  Great 

Lollingdon  Downs  and  Other  Poems 

The  Tragedy  of  Nan  and  Other  Plays 

Reynard  the  Fox,  or  The  Ghost  Heath  Run 

The  Story  of  a  Round-House  and  Other  Poems 

The  Locked  Chest;  and  The  Sweeps  of  Ninety-Eight 

The  Everlasting  Mercy  and  the  Widow  in  the  Bye  Street 


THE  DREAM 


BY 

JOHN  MASEFIELD 


j$cto  gorfe 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

1922 

All  rights  reserved 


COPYRIGHT,  1911, 

BvJOHN  MASEFIELD. 


Published  June,  1922 


p/e 


THE  DREAM 


852472 


\\  7EARY  with  many  thoughts  I  went  to  bed 

And  lay  for  hours  staring  at  the  night, 
Thinking  of  all  the  millions  of  the  dead 
Who  used  man's  flesh,  as  I,  and  loved  the  light, 
Yet  died,  for  all  their  power  and  delight, 
For  all  their  love,  and  never  came  again, 
Never,  for  all  our  crying,  all  our  pain. 


[711 


There,  through  the  open  windows  at  my  side, 
I  saw  the  stars,  and  all  the  tossing  wood, 
And,  in  the  moonlight,  mothy  owls  that  cried, 
Floating  along  the  covert  for  their  food. 
The  night  was  as  a  spirit  that  did  brood 
Upon  the  dead,  those  multitudes  of  death 
That  had  such  colour  once,  and  now  are  breath. 


"And  all  this  beauty  of  the  world,"  I  thought, 
"This  glory  given  by  God,  this  life  that  teems, 
What  can  we  know  of  them?  for  life  is  nought, 
A  few  short  hours  of  blindness,  shot  by  gleams, 
A  few  short  days  of  mastery  of  dreams 
After  long  years  of  effort,  then  an  end, 
Then  dust  on  good  and  bad,  on  foe  and  friend." 


So,  weary  with  the  little  time  allowed 
To  use  the  power  that  takes  so  long  to  learn, 
I  sorrowed  as  I  lay;  now  low,  now  loud 
Came  music  from  an  hautboy  and  zithern. 
The  house  was  dark,  and  yet  a  light  did  burn 
There  where  they  played,  and  in  the  wainscotting 
The  mice  that  love  the  dark  were  junketing. 


CM  3 


So,  what  with  sorrow  and  the  noise  that  seemed 
Like  voices  speaking  from  the  night's  dark  heart 
To  tell  her  secret  in  a  tongue  undreamed, 
I  fell  into  a  dream  and  walked  apart 
Into  the  night  (I  thought)  into  the  swart, 
Thin,  lightless  air  in  which  the  planet  rides; 
I  trod  on  dark  air  upward  with  swift  strides. 


Though  in  my  dream  I  gloried  as  I  trod 
Because  I  knew  that  I  was  striding  there 
Far  from  this  trouble  to  the  peace  of  God 
Where  all  things  glow  and  beauty  is  made  bare. 
A  dawning  seemed  beginning  everywhere, 
And  then  I  came  into  a  grassy  place, 
Where  beauty  of  bright  heart  has  quiet  face. 


Lovely  it  was,  and  there  a  castle  stood 

Mighty  and  fair,  with  golden  turrets  bright, 

Crowned  with  gold  vanes  that  swung  at  the  wind's  mood 

Full  many  a  hundred  feet  up  in  the  light. 

The  walls  were  all  i'-carven  with  delight 

Like  stone  become  alive.     I  entered  in. 

Smoke  drifted  by:   I  heard  a  violin. 


And  as  I  heard,  it  seemed,  that  long  before 

That  music  had  crept  ghostly  to  my  hearing 

Even  as  a  ghost  along  the  corridor 

Beside  dark  panelled  walls  with  portraits  peering ; 

It  crept  into  my  brain,  blessing  and  spearing 

Out  of  the  past,  yet  all  I  could  recall 

Was  some  dark  room  with  firelight  on  the  wall. 


So,  entering  in,  I  crossed  the  mighty  hall ; 
The  volleying  smoke  from  firewood  blew  about. 
The  wind-gusts  stirred  the  hangings  on  the  wall 
So  that  the  woven  chivalry  stood  out 
Wave-like  and  charging,  putting  all  to  rout — 
The  evil  things  they  fought  with,  men  like  beasts, 
Wolf  soldiers,  tiger  kings,  hyena  priests. 


CI93 


And,  steadfast  as  though  frozen,  swords  on  hips, 
Old  armour  stood  at  sentry  with  old  spears 
Clutched  in  steel  gloves  that  glittered  at  the  grips, 
Yet  housed  the  little  mouse  with  pointed  ears: 
Old  banners  drooped  above,  frayed  into  tears 
With  age  and  moth  that  fret  the  soldier's  glory. 
I  saw  a  swallow  in  the  clerestory. 


And  always  from  their  frames  the  eyes  looked  down 
Of  most  intense  souls  painted  in  their  joy, 
Their  great  brows  jewelled  bright  as  by  a  crown 
Of  their  own  thoughts,  that  nothing  can  destroy, 
Because  pure  thought  is  life  without  alloy, 
Life's  very  essence  from  the  flesh  set  free 
A  wonder  and  delight  eternally. 


And  climbing  up  the  stairs  with  arras  hung, 
I  looked  upon  a  court  of  old  stones  grey, 
Where  o'er  a  globe  of  gold  a  galleon  swung 
Creaking  with  age  and  showing  the  wind's  way. 
There,  flattered  to  a  smile,  the  barn  cat  lay 
Tasting  the  sun  with  purrings  drowsily, 
Sun-soaked,  content,  with  drowsed  green-slitted  eye. 


I  did  not  know  what  power  led  me  on 
Save  the  all-living  joy  of  what  came  next. 
Down  the  dim  passage,  doors  of  glory  shone, 
Old  panels  glowed  with  many  a  carven  text, 
Old  music  came  in  strays,  my  mind  was  vext 
With  many  a  leaping  thought;  beyond  each  door 
I  thought  to  meet  some  friend,  dead  long  before. 


So  on  I  went,  and  by  my  side,  it  seemed, 
Paced  a  great  bull,  kept  from  me  by  a  brook 
Which  lipped  the  grass  about  it  as  it  streamed 
Over  the  flagroots  that  the  grayling  shook ; 
Red-felled  the  bull  was,  and  at  times  he  took 
Assayment  of  the  red  earth  with  his  horn 
And  wreaked  his  rage  upon  the  sod  uptorn. 


Yet  when  I  looked  was  nothing  but  the  arras 
There  at  my  side,  with  woven  knights  who  glowed 
In  coloured  silks  the  running  stag  to  harass, 
There  was  no  stream,  yet  in  my  mind  abode 
The  sense  of  both  beside  me  as  I  strode, 
And  lovely  faces  leaned,  and  pictures  came 
Of  water  in  a  great  sheet  like  a  flame; 


Water  in  terror  like  a  great  snow  falling, 
Like  wool,  like  smoke,  into  a  vast  abysm, 
With  thunder  of  gods  fighting  and  death  calling 
And  gleaming  sunbeams  splitted  by  the  prism 
And  cliffs  that  rose  and  eagles  that  took  chrism 
Even  in  the  very  seethe,  and  then  a  cave 
Where  at  a  fire  I  mocked  me  at  the  wave. 


Mightily  rose  the  cliffs ;  and  mighty  trees 

Grew  on  them ;  and  the  caverns,  channelled  deep, 

Cut  through  them  like  dark  veins;  and  like  the  seas, 

Roaring,  the  desperate  water  took  its  leap ; 

Yet  dim  within  the  cave,  like  sound  in  sleep, 

Came  the  fall's  voice ;  my  flitting  fire  made 

More  truth  to  me  than  all  the  water  said. 


Yet  when  I  looked,  there  was  the  arras  only, 
The  passage  stretching  on,  the  pictured  faces, 
The  violin  below  complaining  lonely, 
Creeping  with  sweetness  in  the  mind's  sad  places, 
And  all  my  mind  was  trembling  with  the  traces 
Of  long  dead  things,  of  beautiful  sweet  friends 
Long  since  made  one  with  that  which  never  ends. 


C3O 


And  as  I  went  the  wall  seemed  built  of  flowers, 
Long,  golden  cups  of  tulips,  with  firm  stems, 
Warm-smelling,  for  the  black  bees'  drunken  hours; 
Striped  roses  for  princesses'  diadems; 
And  butterflies  there  were  like  living  gems, 
Scarlet  and  black,  blue  damaskt,  mottled,  white, 
Colour  alive  and  happy,  living  light. 


Then  through  a  door  I  passed  into  a  room 

Where  Daniel  stood,  as  I  had  seen  him  erst, 

In  wisest  age,  in  all  its  happiest  bloom, 

Deep  in  the  red  and  black  of  books  immerst. 

I  would  have  spoken  to  him  had  I  durst, 

But  might  not,  I,  in  that  bright  chamber  strange, 

Where,  even  as  I  lookt,  the  walls  did  change. 


For  now  the  walls  were  as  a  toppling  sea, 
Green,  with  white  crest,  on  which  a  ship  emerging, 
Strained,  with  her  topsails  whining  wrinklingly, 
Dark  with  the  glittering  sea  fires  of  her  surging, 
And,  now  with  thundering  horses  and  men  urging, 
The  walls  were  fields  on  which  men  rode  in  pride, 
On  horses  that  tossed  firedust  in  their  stride. 


C353 


And  now,  the  walls  were  harvest  fields  whose  corn 

Trembled  beneath  the  wrinkling  wind  in  waves 

All  golden  ripe  and  ready  to  be  shorn 

By  sickling  sunburnt  reapers  singing  staves, 

And  now,  the  walls  were  dark  with  wandering  caves 

That  sometimes  glowed  with  fire  and  sometimes  burned 

Where  men  on  anvils  fiery  secrets  learned. 


And  all  these  forms  of  thought,  and  myriads  more, 
Passed  into  books  and  into  Daniel's  hand, 
So  that  he  smiled  at  having  such  great  store 
All  red  and  black  as  many  as  the  sand, 
Studded  with  crystals,  clasped  with  many  a  band 
Of  hammered  steel.   I  saw  him  standing  there. 
After  I  woke  his  pleasure  filled  the  air. 


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